Awful news from Alex Remington, who has become the caretaker of Mac Thomason’s Braves Journal. Mac has been moved to hospice. Nothing in life is certain, but it seems like Mac’s years-long battle with cancer is nearing its end.
I wrote about Mac last October when his prognosis became bleak and he set off from his home in Alabama to go to Philadelphia for experimental treatment. Always one to (jokingly) hate on anything and everything that is not the Atlanta Braves, I’m sure Mac has felt no small amount of irony being in Philly all of this time. After all, he taught me everything I know about Philly trolling. I force it, but for him it was effortless. Like this sort of thing, from the beginning of some random series against the Phillies sometime in the past few years:
Always droll and always cranky. And his readers love him for it.
There’s no way I’m doing what I do today if it weren’t for Mac. I had let my baseball fandom wane a great bit by the time I stumbled over Braves Journal. He allowed me to catch up when life seemed too busy for baseball, and eventually it became so enjoyable catching up over at Braves Journal each day I made the time for it. All because a university librarian from Alabama had nothing better to do with his nights than watch every single Braves game and recap it. And yeah, I pretty much ripped off the tone of his recaps for “And That Happened.”
Here’s hoping Mac’s final days, if indeed these are his final days, are comfortable and peaceful. Thanks for your inspiration, Mac.